Idol Worship

"You shall have no other gods before Me. You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth. You shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third an the fourth generations of those who hate Me"
     -Exodus 20:3-5

     When you hear the word "idol", what comes to your mind? Bad singers? An English guy who never has anything nice to say? A statue made of gold, silver, or stone? 

     Webster defines an idol as "a representation or symbol of an object of worship" (www.merriam-webster.com). Since early Bible times, people all over the world have created "gods" out of wood, stone, and other materials, and would bow down in worship. As strange as this concept may seem to us today, we in some ways do the exact same thing every day. I think that most of us have something in our lives that we "bow down" to and "worship". This looks different for everybody. For some, it could be a boyfriend or a girlfriend. For others, it could be money, celebrities, our even themselves! Sometimes we take something of this world, and put it where only God should be.

     This is a HUGE problem! The Bible says very clearly that we are supposed to worship God, and serve Him only (Matthew 4:10)! Why in the world would we put anything before God? Is that really something that we want to do? I can tell you that it's not something that I want to do, because the Bible also says that people who commit idolatry WILL NOT INHERIT THE KINGDOM OF GOD (Galatians 5:19-21)! In fact, it says in Revelation 21:8 that idolaters belong in "the lake the burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death"! If that doesn't scare you, then I don't know what will. 

     In the end, each of us has a choice to make; God, or our "idol". We must pick one or the other, because we cannot have both.